Mindfulness Therapy (MBCT)
If you’re feeling stuck in a cycle of recurring sadness or frustration, you might be considering therapy as your next step. We provide treatment for individuals struggling with depression, chronic unhappiness, and emotional challenges that don’t seem to go away on their own.
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Do You Worry About Depression Coming Back?
It’s easy to feel overwhelmed by persistent sadness, anxiety, or negative thought patterns. You might struggle to stay present, constantly replaying the past or worrying about the future. Mindfulness-based therapy can help you break these cycles, reconnect with the present moment, and manage your thoughts and emotions in a healthier way.
Persistent feelings of sadness surface
You might notice that no matter how much effort you put into feeling better, the sadness keeps lingering. It can feel like an emotional weight that doesn’t lift, leaving you frustrated and questioning if you’ll ever truly feel content again.
Constant worry about the future sets in
Even when things start to improve, you may find yourself anxious that it won’t last. There’s a constant fear that the depression or sadness will return, making it difficult to enjoy positive moments without worrying about what comes next.
Therapy can help
Regardless of your struggles, you may be considering that it’s time to talk to a therapist.
Schedule your Free 15 min Consultation
It is common that you may be experiencing depression again.
In fact, many individuals who experience one depressive episode will have another in the future. Knowing this, as well as knowing how difficult it can be to manage life’s challenges, it is important that you learn the skills you need to respond differently to your sadness and depression. We can help you to learn more about how your thoughts affect your feelings and then work to change your response to the thoughts that are causing problems.
This is often the part that maintains depression or keep it coming back. For example, you may wake up and feel sad as many people do, but then have thoughts such as “Why am I feeling this way again? I always feel this way. Nothing will ever help. It is hopeless.” MBCT was developed to help you start to notice and manage these types of thoughts. Specifically, it can help you catch and practice sitting with difficult thoughts, and learn to open up or even welcome these thoughts. This can help to free up new options for how to be effective in responding to your thoughts that don’t perpetuate old cycles and continue to get you stuck.
You may have tried all different types of therapy but nothing has stopped depression from recurring.
It can be hard to tolerate problems without being driven to find the solution. Many of us have learned that problems are the “enemy” and therefore believe that once they are gone, everything will be fine. Thinking this way can result in worry and rumination that keeps you focused on your problems and feeling stuck instead of moving forward. MBCT will help you to first recognize how fighting against unwanted thoughts, emotions, urges, or physical sensations can actually create more distress. MBCT will then teach you to observe your experiences and create a new way of relating to them, especially those that are difficult or painful.
MBCT was developed to help you understand your depression and what maintains it. An important part of the skills we teach are to prevent depression from coming back. You will learn how to notice your specific depression signature (your set of depression symptoms and the order in which they tend to occur), including the first symptoms that typically happen so you can catch it early. You will also learn how to respond effectively so that you prevent it from getting worse, and intervene in what used to be a recurring and unhelpful pattern.
Many people struggle with understanding their own emotions.
With so many thoughts and feelings running through your mind, it can be difficult to know what’s normal, especially when typical solutions like self-care or distraction aren’t helping. Mindfulness-based therapy can offer new ways to understand and manage these emotions, helping you break out of old patterns and find more lasting relief.
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You May Have Some Questions About MBCT…
How can talking about depression possibly help me to feel better?
In MBCT, you will be supported and validated by other group members and will realize that they are going through the same things you are. This can help you to feel less distressed. Through talking and participating, you will acquire skills and strategies to help you manage your sadness and depression more effectively.
MBCT and MindWell NYC don’t just focus on treating your depression in the moment. We also focus on keeping it from coming back and teach you how to live your life differently in the meantime. We are happy to provide you with additional information about what MBCT is and how it is different from other treatments you may have tried.
I tried mindfulness or meditation before and it did not or does not work for me.
Meditation is one way to practice mindfulness, but you do not have to practice meditation to be mindful. In MBCT, we focus on mindfulness specifically- turning your attention to the present moment in a nonjudgmental way. Mindfulness has a lot of myths associated with it. One is that you have to ‘clear your mind’ in order to do it ‘correctly.’ In reality, mindfulness is about taking the time to think about the present moment. As long as you are paying attention to what your mind is doing, you’re being mindful! There is no ‘right’ or ‘wrong’ way to do it.
I don’t want to focus on my depressive thoughts because I think it might make my depression worse.
It makes sense that this is a concern of yours. The problem with not focusing on your depressive thoughts is that over time, they often come back louder and more intensely. MBCT teaches you how to learn to sit with and tolerate them instead of pushing them away, which makes life easier and reduces your suffering. We will teach you the necessary techniques and strategies to learn to do this effectively.